One World Birth in Canada

(Make sure you see the video at the bottom of the post!)

If you’ve signed up to receive our newsletter you’ll already know that we are about to bring some big changes to One World Birth which means we will have to shut down most of the site for a few weeks.

However, while we are busying ourselves with this, I thought I’d cut together some of the footage we shot while we were in North America and upload the results as a series of short films that will be more of a “behind-the-scenes” look at the first steps in our journey into the world of birth. Hopefully it will be enough to whet your appetite for what is to come!

Here are some stats from this journey: (sorry, I just can’t help it – I’m male!)

North American Midwifery Conference

And what a place to start – Niagara Falls. You can just imagine how long it took Toni and I to debate the value in spending three days and nights in a world class hotel overlooking the falls themselves!

Jennie Joseph

We had been invited to film at the inaugural North American Midwifery Conference that was being hosted jointly by CAM, MANA and ACNM. Interviews included the presidents of all the major midwifery organizations as well as individual midwives from all over the continent. We must have filmed interviews with over 30 people each of whom had interesting things to say.

Aboriginal Midwifery

One World Birth is about bringing together the wealth of knowledge and expertise from all around the globe, but it is also about highlighting where things are going seriously wrong and the efforts that are being made to right these wrongs. We were intrigued and sometimes shocked by many of the stories that were coming out of the more isolated communities of Canada.

Sacheen Point

I was particularly moved by Sacheen who told us about the forced relocation of expectant young mothers from her First Nation community on Vancouver Island to the big city where they are without their friends and families at what must be the most sensitive and terrifying time of their lives. We also heard from midwives working in Inuit communities where mothers-to-be suffered similar treatment.

Our insight into this practice was only brief, but it is something that we are determined to revisit and feature in a very big way.

Local Action for Global Change

Here at One World Birth we believe in the power of what we are calling Local Action for Global Change.

The initial idea behind setting up the web site was to help communities and individuals inspire one another into action and to learn from one another’s campaigns to see how to bring about change

Where’s My Midwife? has its routes in Wilmington, North Carolina, but when Maria Radonicich, one of its founding members, relocated to a town just north of Toronto, Where’s My Midwife? Ontario (WMMO) was born and it is now fully operational and busy flexing its campaigning muscles to bring about necessary changes in the province with plans to spread throughout the whole of Canada.

We witnessed the power of concerted effort and dogged determination when we were invited by our super-doula host, Charity Pigeau, to film a WMMO march through the streets of Orangeville that ended up at the local hospital where only two midwives had privileges to practice. WMMO have been campaigning for 18 months to get privileges for more midwives, but their efforts had so far been met by stony silence from the hospital.

We were bowled over by a community’s spirit and relentless drive to bring about change and their story is to be the first featured in our Local Action for Global Change reports, a taster of which you can see in the video below. We’re sure their story is going to inspire other communities all around the world and provide much needed encouragement to those who feel like they’re battling an insurmountable force.

So, here’s the video, the first in a series that I shall be uploading over the next few weeks in anticipation of the re-launch. I hope you enjoy it!

Here in Montreal we are struggling to keep our volunteer doula organization going. We provide refugees, new immigrants and other needy women with free doula services. We have been working on no funding for almost ten years and we may have to close our doors…would you like to shine some publicity on our plight??

Love what you are doing. I’m from Australia and trying to do my bit to raise awareness around issues to do with birth through creating art that shows women empowered in birth rather than passive. Amazing how many people are shocked by natural active birth positions and celebrating the process rather than fearing it. Have great midwives to thank for 2 wonderful births at home in water. Want more women to have access to such options and information about the possibilities of birth. Am following your project with interest.